


bothersome

by MKYouth



Series: crack but serioused (probably) [6]
Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: F/F, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, I Don't Even Know, Personification, but lesbians - Freeform, essential to the fic, metaphor probably
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-15
Updated: 2021-02-15
Packaged: 2021-03-16 10:28:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29452335
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MKYouth/pseuds/MKYouth
Summary: The Inbetween had seen lots of people run out of time.She’d thought his time was going to fizzle out here. She’d prepared a speech of life and death—the triumphs of his life and the failures—his wrongdoings and his good, but the third roar never came—and she sat on her throne and scrunched her brows; trying to find something in the world to tell her why. She’d been so sure.And that’s when she met them.Pandora's Vault, The Prison.Whom paused the clock on their own terms.
Relationships: The Inbetween & Everyone, The Inbetween/Pandoras Vault
Series: crack but serioused (probably) [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2035015
Comments: 6
Kudos: 7





	bothersome

**Author's Note:**

  * For [que_sera_sera](https://archiveofourown.org/users/que_sera_sera/gifts).



> i speedran the ending during the tales today 2/14/2020 lol anyway read

They start completely separate lives. 

One, a heaven forged by the gods;  _ a god _ . A conscious of its own, older than the concept of time itself—a place that has seen it all and none of it at the same time, homing the lost, the dead, and the living. It seeks to carry on, let things happen at natural—never to interfere, but aid. Doesn’t follow orders; doesn’t give commands, something at the side than the front. Only finding a sense of humanity within those that find their way within its gardens and walls.

And the other; A hell, made by the hands of those it homes. A prison, it’s thoughts built on the love and the life forged within its walls. To keep one locked away, to strip them of their power—their thought of time—sanity—and everything between, and to keep them from doing any more malice to the world. Unnatural, and yet the things that happen to bring those within its walls feels natural all the same. 

But soon they find themselves within each other's shoes. 

Isn’t that strange?

* * *

They meet on the 20th, January.

_ The Inbetween _ feels him enter and exit her realm at rapid, her clear skies clouded by the dark of his mind—a thunder roaring which each death he fails to save, she hears his words echo in her mind and she feels the axe go through his chest and sword into his back. She never once winces, she doesn’t even flinch.  _ Dream _ , she’d been all too familiar with the name and yet never found herself in his presence. 

She’d heard it uttered under the breath of the children, tales of wars against his land to gain their freedom; stories of aid from outer forces, betrayals, and the wicked grin he’d wear on his mask to cover any idea of true emotion that may dance across his face and show any humanity in his figure. She’d never let those kids leave too quick, she’d guide them to the swings with soft whispers at the back of their minds and she’d tell them to sit, to laugh, to love in the midst of war.

She’d heard it in the panicked thoughts of the fallen hero, the old president—the soldiers and the son.

She’d let them forget for the shortest moments; but they’d always been keen to return quick and get their jobs done—at least when they still had time.

_ The Inbetween _ had seen lots of people run out of time. 

She’d thought his time was going to fizzle out here. She’d prepared a speech of life and death—the triumphs of his life and the failures—his wrongdoings and his good, but the third roar never came—and she sat on her throne and scrunched her brows; trying to find something in the world to tell her  _ why.  _ She’d been so  _ sure _ .

And that’s when she met them. 

_ Pandora's Vault, The Prison. _

Whom paused the clock on their own terms. 

“Who are you?” She’d asked at their gates, shut tight in compact blackstone covers—feeling the buzz of the redstone wiring from the door feet away. 

There was a beat or two, the building seemingly waking up from a slumber; coming to life before her very eyes, and she wasn’t one to look away from such wonder. They’d breathed, the walls warping within her vision before a similarly sized presence to herself had entered her mind.

She’d taken a step forward to the door, pressing a hand against the wall and phasing in; eyes closed and focused, a figure appearing in the back of her mind—the face of a worker with more importance tied to their name than any other. 

She’d scoffed at that. 

“Now's not the time,” They’d hushed under breath, “He’s coming.”

“Dream?”

“The Prisoner, are you familiar with his name?” They’d rushed across her mind, voice fading in and out of focus—it made her dizzy, weak in the arms and knees—and the heat from the pouring lava within the walls accompanied by the low, mechanical hum was anything but helpful to her. 

She’d thrived in nature, natural flow. 

And  _ Pandora _ was anything but.

“Very,” She’d leaned against the receptionists’ desk, “I was expecting him.”

“Where?”—and the world comes to still around her.

She pats down her hair, adjusts her skirt, and fixes her collar; “In the  _ Inbetween _ .”

The Prison moves on; slower, they say, “Where…?”

“ _ Me _ .”

That time; it was delicate. 

“You’re like me.”

“Not at all,” and she gathers herself to leave, “I’m not a  _ Prison _ , I’m a  _ Safehaven _ —and I was supposed to take him away.”

_ Pandora  _ sets a palm down on the desk, “Take him to heaven? I don’t think that’s where he should be ending up.”

“He’d... not necessarily be treated well. Here’s consequences for being in my realm,” _ The Inbetween _ ficks an eye up and down their form, “I’d be doing something other than this—something  _ effective. _ ”

They sit, “You’re implying a lot when  _ Ghostbur  _ roams around.”

“Every case is different.”

And the grind of gears fills the both of their ears; pistons and slime and honey moving thousands of pounds of blackstone back from the manipulated power of redstone and portals.

_ The Vault  _ waves a hand away, “I’m sure of it, you’d better run off now.”

She watches him come in; bruised, cuffed, and utterly pathetic from what she’d heard in the tales. 

The Warden walks through her and past—when she turns, Pandora is gone. 

She shakes her head.

She takes a breath.

And she returns home.

* * *

The next is the 30th, January.

_ He _ falls into a state they both can see.

_ He _ , the one heavily affected by both of their spells, falls into a dream-like state of it all; the  _ nightmare _ prodding at his mind and sending him further down her pit.

And she? She turns away from  _ Pandora  _ and she cradles him in her pillowed arms all the way into her world. She puts a warm towel on his head and lays him to rest in the grass of her gardens, she reads him a story of the past while he stirs in his sleep, and when he wakes she comforts him about the world and explains to him her place—all the while knowing,  _ he won't remember _ —and this time around she is able to affirm that it isn’t just her power doing it. 

When she’s able to send him back down; a smile on his face for the first time in a while and the worried crease of his forehead smoothed out into a relaxed expression, she relaxes herself. 

That is, until they visit. 

She doesn’t protest—because  _ they _ got involved in this. The both of them, a hand in his head the entire time—watching the scene, waiting it out just to sweep him away. 

So they stand at the stairs of her entrance; their dark getup a sharp contrast of the bright and airy world around them. They seemed solid, a solid figure standing atop clouds, sinking into the ground at slow pace—the comfort of her life bouncy and deflects off their figure like birds on glass, she stands at the top with her hands folding on themselves. 

“Welcome.” She steps down the stairs, sizing herself up on theirself. There’s a distant chime of bells, the laughter of kids, and a breeze of the wind floats by. 

_ Pandora _ presents formal; and yet their stance is stiff, their eyes fixed on the shape of her build and the energy that slides in their walls and buzzes their wiring with a new life—”You’re…”

They bite the inside of their lip, bringing their gaze down to hers; “You’re involved with him as well?”

_ The Inbetween _ huffs off a flush; “Unintentionally so.”

She steps aside, a hand placed in front of theirs. The prison takes it, linking their arms and letting the haven guide them through their halls. 

“He slips in my world every now and then, and yet his clock is so rhythmic with it’s ticking.” She sighs, the doors opening before them, “A peculiar thing he does.”

_ The Prison _ tenses their jaw, consciously trying to keep themself from going slack jawed at the ethereal architecture of her palace; the light bouncing off the walls, seemingly  _ emitting _ rays that the Prison would only feel on their back on the brightest of days with no effort whatsoever. They count their own breaths, grounding themself on the land of this realm; “He’s tied to my prisoner.”

“Only one?”

“For now,” She leads them through grass, breaking her arm away and sitting herself on swings leaving them to follow—”Maximum security,  _ Dream _ has his hand in  _ Ranboos _ head despite my efforts.”

She ducks her head down, “Hm well—I guess I was right.”

“Pardon?” Pandora turns their head to her, a brow raised.

_ The Inbetween _ suppresses a smile; “He would've done better in my hands.”

“He would’ve been dead in your hands—a ghost,” They roll their eyes, “Besides, this is a mental thing is it not; he’s different from the rest, who's to say he wouldn’t have  _ ruined _ you?”

She pushes her swing forward, hair waving with the invisible breeze, “Has he ruined you?”

Pandora shuts their mouth.

“Very well then,” She smirks, “You’re very stubborn, have you been told that before?”

“I’ve been told I’m secure—scary, even. A bit counter intuitive, those are.” Pandora digs their heel into the grass below, dirt upturning more with every word. She sighs at the scene, knowing it will all revert when they leave. 

She taps her fingers along the metal bars, “Will you be leaving soon?”

Pandora nods; “Well—yes, but I don’t have much else to do.”

“Stay will you? It gets lonely here. No one stays that long.”

The Prison huffs a laugh, “Oh your stealing my job? Imprisoning me?”

  
  
“A small sentence. There aren’t many of us around,” She looks to the sky, memory fuzzing the lines of the land; distantly, she remembers the life of _L’manburg_ , a budding nation personified with might—turned sour as the years went by, their own lives thawing away with each bullet the people sent their way. Tragic, to see a god fall so fast. _The Inbetween_ laid her to rest that day it all went away, “Too many builds get taken down.”

“I won’t be leaving anytime soon,” they stretch their hands, “Made of bedrock, blackstone, iron—it would take dedication, too much of it.”

She thinks, for a moment, about Snowchester; the spirit young, on edge, and armed—”Mhm.”

Pandora stands, reaching a hand to her; “Show me around will you?”

_ The Inbetween _ looks up, a small flush dusting her face—”Of course.”

* * *

Recent brings the 3rd of February. 

Time travel is a dangerous thing, but  _ The Inbetween _ had seen it all. She had been there, she had done that; and nothing was enough to make her bring a fist down on these endeavors he went on.  _ Karl _ , went on. His intentions were not weak, they were not simmering with malice—each adventure brought him a new sense to life, taking with it a piece that he’d originally known. 

An exchange. One that she’d had to take out herself, not something she’d ever written; not something she’d never change on her own… but there were things stirring in the world out of her control. 

_ She’d seen red.  _ Spotted in her vision one day; a man stumbled into her arms all alone one day, diamond decorated his skin and deflected her own light right back at her. She’d taken him to the gardens, she’d taken him to the beds—the dinners, it all.  _ Skeppy _ ; his life was dulled, his blues tinted dark and she’d worked to scrub it away. The color left stains on her skin, bedded under her nails and made her scratch away until her fingers shone raw, something dangerous called from the back of her world, her mind, and she’d sent him back before it could truly crawl under her skin. 

And when he returned that night with red fogging his mind she knew something was to be done. 

She’d seen the people affected by magics of the land; madness pulled at any man who stayed around the ruins of  _ Pogtopia’s _ once flourishing ravines much too long—people would be gifted the luck of riches after dipping their toes in the holy land of  _ Church Prime _ — _ The Castle _ granted any man a title of importance when he stayed, even the old land that once was the  _ Community House _ had brought a calming sense of home in anyone who rummaged through those chests when they once were. 

_ Never _ ; in her life, did she see something with effects as dangerous as  _ The Egg. _

_ (He had changed the timeline, his clumsy hand tearing away at the dirt and breaking the button; unsetting the TNT in hope of a brighter future. She had turned her eye blind and let him do what had to be done.) _

_ She never interfered _ —but that clock was running its time thin. 

She guides him as she would any other time, her hands in lock with his as they walk through the building. She speaks, for once in her life she speaks of importance than false affirmations and white lies; she tells him something he  _ will _ remember. She lifts her spell—for the slightest of moments—and she lets him remember. 

Yet; through it all she keeps her trick.  _ He’d do the tasks, he traded it for this memory.  _ For now, he would need to be quick, he would need to write; protect and grow his library, alter time, do what he needs to do to fix this future. He would soon discover what it all meant, and how to bring it all together. To bring himself together. 

And that is what brings them here.

“You’ve caught a prisoner of your own, eh?” 

They walk up the stairs of her tower, she can feel the way each of their steps send an echo down her stairwells and the way the noise bounces off her walls; she sets her arms crossed atop the windowsill, her gaze falling over her own build. 

“I’m not a prison,” her words are a whisper in the wind over her own castle view, “It’s a quest; a hero's journey.”

“You didn’t give him a choice.”

“We all make sacrifices,” she turns to face the hall; their figure taking final steps up her tower, “His was memory, choice. Mine was law; moral. What have you taken?”

“Sanity, not of my own. He’s controlling, you know; even in my rot.” They stand at the stair, and she thinks back to another time; they look past her, gaze trailing her view; “ _ Gorgeous. _ ”

_ The Inbetween  _ ducks her head; “You’re blunt.”

“How could I not be?” They take a step forward, “You’re stunning.”

“You’re distracting me.”

“From what?”—they take her hand—”Your reality? You called me stubborn, so I guess you could say in more than one way we’re the same.”

She bites at the nails of her other, pulling back; “We’re…”

“I want to explore you,” they put a hand on her waist, “explore with you. Show me your secrets, find them and share.”

“You could never do it at one time.”—She flushes, dipping her head.

“Then let me continue this,” They take her hand away from her lips and to theirs; planting a kiss on their hand; “Let us continue our time.”

“Yours will run out before me,” She leans into their touch, “We’re not the same.”

They smile, “Then you’ll live on knowing I was with you, whenever I go down. The happiest I could be.”

“I hate you—you mess with my head.”

“Shouldn’t I be the one saying that?” They pull away, leaning their back against the ledge.

“You’re not supposed to … there’s so many worlds and yet yours—” she lets out an exasperated laugh, “yours managed to prevail. Everything involved in this world, it’s unnatural—it wasn’t supposed to happen, and yet it is.”

_ Pandora _ throws their gaze over the castle; “Make the most of it?”

  
And  _ The Inbetween  _ huffs a noise—crooked smile falling over their face, “ _ Fuck it _ . Do you want to see my library?”

**Author's Note:**

> ignore that last part i was thinking about . . . erm . . . anyway 
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